RICHARD WALKER / RWALKER@STARBULLETIN.COM
Ricardo Polendey, whose wife, Aquilina, was killed in the recent Kunia Road crash, and his niece, Annie Cruz, thanked those in attendance yesterday at the FilCom Center for their help in recent days.

Celebration also aids Kunia tragedy

A Filipino centennial event raises funds for crash victims' families

An event celebrating 100 years of Filipino immigration in Hawaii yesterday also helped raise money for the families of four Filipino farm women killed Monday in a traffic accident on Kunia Road.

"Sakada Sights and Sounds" -- a production with music, old still photographs and performers reenacting some of the experiences of the first Filipino farm workers in Hawaii -- "had been scheduled for quite some time," said Toy Arre, president of the FilCom Center in Waipahu.

Two days after the accident that killed four women who were on their way to work at Larry Jefts Farm in Ewa, Arre was wondering how the Filipino community could help the women's families.

RICHARD WALKER / RWALKER@STARBULLETIN.COM
Sonia Lumabao put money in a collection box set up to raise funds for relatives of those killed in the crash. At lower left is Cecilia Villafuerte, a FilCom board member who was at the donation desk.

Raising funds for them at yesterday's event at the FilCom Center was a natural, Arre said, since their farm work continued the tradition of Filipino contributions to Hawaii.

Eight others were injured when the pickup truck they were riding in to work swerved to avoid a vehicle passing illegally, and ran into the path of a concrete truck.

Three women remain in the Queen's Medical Center and are improving, said Elma Noble, a nurse and social worker who is acting as an advocate for victims' families.

Because the farm workers were in a company truck, on their way to work, workers' compensation insurance will help with medical and other expenses, Noble said.

On Thursday and Friday, donations were nearly $3,000, Arre said, and he hopes that at least $20,000 can be raised to distribute among the families of the four women.

"Thank you so much for your support and for helping us, especially the moral support," Annie Cruz, a niece of Aquilina Polendey, told several hundred people in the FilCom Center ballroom last night.

Her uncle, Ricardo Polendey, thanked the crowd in Ilocano for helping the family. He said he, his brother, his sister and their spouses plan to return his wife's body to the Philippines for burial next week.

All the other families plan to do the same, said Emme Tomimbang, a member of the FilCom Center Board of Governors. Sending a body to the Philippines can cost $6,000 and the families also need to cover their own airfares, she said.

Also attending the event last night were Arsenio Sacalamitao, whose sister Ana Sacalamitao was killed, and Rowena and Dolores Laroco, whose mother was killed.

Laroco said she wishes the person who was driving the vehicle that caused the tragic accident would come forward and admit it, "instead of denying the whole thing."

TO DONATE

Two funds have been established to assist the families of the women.

» Operation Ohana, at the FilCom Center, will accept donations for the families through May 13. Write "Operation Ohana" or "Kunia crash victims" on donations and mail or bring to the FilCom Center, 94-428 Mokuola St., Waipahu, HI 96767.

» The Bank of Hawaii has established a Kunia Farm Workers Memorial Fund, to which donations can be made at any Bank of Hawaii branch.